


Knight Takes Rook

by MonPetitParselmouth



Series: Endless Cycle of Vengeance [9]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: #StopRichardHowe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Angelica has romance problems, Chess Metaphors, Cliffhanger, F/F, Gen, Love Triangles, Murder, Sort Of, if you look reaaaaaaally hard, like damn, the plot has arrived and it's 8 chapters late, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-05-14
Packaged: 2019-05-06 22:28:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14657520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MonPetitParselmouth/pseuds/MonPetitParselmouth
Summary: “How do I know I can trust you?” she challenged.He smiled a little, but Angelica was sharp enough to catch a flash of sorrow streaking across his expression. “You don’t,” he said.(Or, six murders, three truths, two revelations, and one promise.)





	Knight Takes Rook

Maria didn’t know when she had blacked out. 

She didn’t know where she was, or why suddenly her falling-off-a-twenty-story-building induced agony had been gradually reduced to a mere aching throb. All she knew was that now she was staring at a cream-colored ceiling in a surprisingly vast bedroom that was clearly uninhabited, sparsely furnished and likely a guest room. Maria was wearing a light pink blouse and gold leggings that most definitely did not belong to her, lying motionlessly under a bedspread, trying desperately to think where the heck she could be. 

“. . . hope _you_ didn’t do that to her.”

“. . .think I would stoop that low, Liz? She and Theo . . .”

“Well, at least. . . Cataclysm. . . down?”

“Please . . . found. . . . near Broadway Street. . . I’m not that ignoble.”

Maria tried to ignore the faint snatches of conversation and focused on her own mind. The last thing she remembered was the click of a shoe on the ground right next to her head, and the her nemesis’ voice. 

Speaking of which . . . 

“Oh, are you awake?” 

Not Archangel, but still. . . familiar.

She whipped her head around so fast that a jarring blast of electricity shot up her spine, and she winced, waiting for the edge of the phantom pain to dull again. Apparently she wasn’t completely healed yet. 

There was a pretty brunette-haired girl leaning in the doorway, clad in a summer-sky-blue cardigan and smiling earnestly. It took Maria a moment to fit the face, which she recognized somehow, too, with the voice. 

 _Oh_. The face was that of the girl who worked at the orphanage across the street from the ceramics store, and. . . . 

And her voice was the Blue Phoenix’s. 

Maria’s brain bounced around within itself a couple times before resolutely skittering to a halt. 

. . . _What._

“Where—” she started, throat rasping, and then cleared her throat. “Where am I?” she asked. It was cliché, but she was unable to think of something else coherent to say. 

The girl shifted slightly. “Our apartment.”

“Our?” Maria repeated. 

“Eliza?” 

Somebody else appeared in the door frame, chestnut eyes shimmering and jumping with intelligence and this feeling of knowing _exactly_ what was going on in your brain, and Maria instantly felt every shred of her remaining self-control drop to the floor and splinter into a million shards. 

This girl. 

This girl was _gorgeous_. 

“She’s awake, Angie,” said the blue one. _Eliza_. 

“I can see that,” ‘Angie’ bit out, gaze suspicious, eyebrows knitted together. “Have you completely healed her?”

Eliza blew out a breath, visibly exhausted. “Yes.”

Those eyes, vivid brown and so shockingly bright, narrowed. “How do we know she won’t try anything?”

“Angelica,” said Eliza patiently, and Maria felt a rush of something fresh and hot and so, so familiar— _I know her name now_ —“she just fell off the top of a _building_ , traveled across half the city, and had about half her bones mended forcibly by means of magic. I doubt she’s about to, as you put it, ‘try anything’, even if she does try to kill you every other Thursday.”

Maria bit her lip, hard, and shoved the thoughts of nights in the dark, with nobody but Archangel—Angelica, her name was _Angelica_ —because she couldn’t afford a weakness like that, not while in an apartment with two potential enemies.

But that was exactly the issue. They weren’t acting like enemies. Angelica had dragged her, injured and unconscious, halfway across the city, Eliza had healed her wounds, and they had openly given her their identities. 

Maria shook her head and spent next twelve hours passed in excruciating confusion. 

Eliza came to routinely check on Maria once a half-hour or so, and had slipped in at various intervals throughout the night. Maria couldn’t remember giving them her name, couldn’t remember giving them her trust. But at some point she must have, because as morning sunlight streamed through her window—which _grey curtains grey curtains don’t panic you are Maria Lewis you are sixteen years old not twelve and Reynolds is dead, dead, gone_ —the sound of it rang through the apartment. 

“Maria.” 

She’d heard her alias on those lips before, sometimes threatening and spat across a battlefield, sometimes lustful and breathed against her mouth, dewy and thick. But never before had she heard her true name in that voice. Something about it made her shiver.

Angelica’s gaze pierced her knowingly, making Maria shiver. “I wanted to check in on you.”

“You. . .  did?” Nothing Maria could think of explained that, and suspicion knotted tightly in her throat. “Why?” she snapped, with more force than she knew was necessary. “Because you think I’m going to _try something_?” Bitterness punched through the last three syllables as Maria struggled fiercely to keep up her glare, even as she wished she could just look away, didn’t feel compelled to stare at this phenomenon of a human being. 

Angelica said, “No. I don’t think that at all.” Her eyes looked haunted. “I trust you not to do that.”

Seven matter-of-fact words that rendered Maria Lewis absolutely speechless.

 

»»——————¤-------------««

 

_Chat: where we plan the destruction of nyc_

 

arsonist: uh 

 

arsonist: guys

 

arsonist: you miiiiiight want to check the news

 

the marquis: ????

 

Wraith: Wait, wait, wait, wait

 

Wraith: Are you referring to what I think you’re referring to?

 

the marquis: ????????????

 

arsonist: just look. please.

 

the marquis: hold on

 

the marquis: ddkjdfhdkdkh 

 

the marquis: Who??? did that???

 

arsonist: @Cataclysm

 

arsonist: @Cataslysm

 

Wraith: Where’s Maria?

 

arsonist: I haven’t seen her since last night…

 

the marquis: Do you think it was her

 

arsonist: no. To do something like that takes some kind of insanity that none of us possess

 

the marquis: why would somebody do that?

 

the marquis: what do they gain? what are they planning?

 

arsonist: we.

 

arsonist: don’t.

 

arsonist: know.

 

the marquis: wait a second it just updated, they managed to get a picture of the person who did it before they got away

 

arsonist: WHOA WHOA WHOA

 

arsonist: IS THAT WHO I THINK IT IS 

 

the marquis: Mon dieu, it is

 

Wraith: Oh, this is bad. 

 

»»——————¤-------------««

 

It was 6:14 in the morning, and Theo’s life had officially gone to the depths of hell in a freaking handbasket.

First, she’d fallen off a building the night before, only saving herself by lunging for the nearest window at superhuman speed and hurling through it, shattering it into pieces but hauling herself in safely. Second, she’d let Cataclysm get away, and now Eliza was acting strange and Angelica stranger. 

Third, Richard goddamn Howe, governor of New York State, was, apparently, a supervillain, and had just.

Well. 

 _Murdered_ somebody. 

Yes, the police were there, the ambulance, lights flashing blindingly like strobes and yes, the man’s heartbeat had been checked, and he had been declared lost already. But Theo felt like the globe should stop moving, time should lock into place, so she could take her time digesting the horrifying news. Just minutes ago she’d been playing Scrabble with Alex, trying to comprehend how he'd managed to use _both_ ‘incomprehensibility’ and ‘adamantine’ in the space of three turns, her only worry a nagging wonder why the Schuyler sisters wouldn’t answer her texts other than to say they were at home, and fine. 

(Did they know what had happened? Did they know the city as they knew it was forced jaggedly into something ominously new?)

And now the whole world had been wrenched off its axis, its orbit wrangled into a pathetic mess of _feardeathnothingnesshelpless_.

_Nothing._

_She._

_Could._

_Do._

At least they’d caught his identity, and now he was definitely wanted, definitely not in office now, definitely had a special, designated hot line that people, in the unlikely event of spotting him, could call. At least part of his plot had been foiled. But that was little solace, in the face of a man’s life being ripped away.

And as Theo found out later, it hadn’t just been any man, it had been Howe’s long-term political rival, Joseph Galloway, who had displayed interest in running against him next election. 

And his innocent family. Wife, three children, and an eight-six-year-old great-aunt. 

Pale, their skin stiff and grey. Eyes glassy, like beady marbles. Limp, nothing but mere rag dolls.  

Poisoned. 

Alex was turned away, his face frozen in a permanent grimace. He hadn’t spoken a word since they had found out what had happened and raced to the crime scene. Theo had known not to try to disturb him, knowing he was surely reliving his own nightmare, when his entire village had sprawled out dead on the dirt-stained sandy banks of Nevis, skulls cracked and mouths seeping blood. She didn't know how many had died then—cousins, family friends, visitors, anybody—but she did know how many had died now, and she did know that both times, she and Alex couldn’t do anything, because time could not be turned back, and they were dead. 

 

_Joseph Galloway._

 

_Grace Emtiaz-Galloway._

 

_Danielle Galloway._

 

_Yolanda Galloway._

 

_Seamus Galloway._

 

_Evangeline Spencer._

 

All of them long past the point of saving. 

Who, wondered Theo—wondered the entire street, wondered Manhattan, wondered the city, the state, the country—was next?

 

»»——————¤——————««

 

_Chat: superladies_

 

lady liberty: @Archangel @bluephoenix

 

lady liberty:  Have you read the news?

 

lady liberty: [http.nytimes.com/ny/events/howe-revealed-six-dead&r=&t=0](http://http.nytimes.com/ny/events/howe-revealed-six-dead&r=&t=0) 

 

lady liberty: somebody. Please. 

 

lady liberty: somebody needs to help.

 

lady liberty: Anybody.

 

»»——————¤——————««

 

She couldn’t be doing this. 

And she knew it. Angelica knew it. They both did. But in the exactly three minutes that had elapsed since Maria had allowed her walls of deniability to break and passion to come rushing out, she didn’t have time to think about it. 

Up against the wall. Wasn’t that a saying? Up against the wall. Trapped. Cornered. Helpless. 

Here Maria was, literally pinned against the wall, and yes, utterly helpless. 

Their lips were hardly touching, Angelica’s breath, ragged and hot with desire, ghosting across Maria’s cheek, Maria fighting, fighting so hard to crush her venturesome _wanting_. 

God, Angelica was beautiful. Every strand of curly black hair, every flick of her tongue was beautiful as the sweet, light kiss went on. 

Until it wasn’t sweet and light anymore. 

Maria hadn’t realized how much she needed this until her own tongue was exploring Angelica’s mouth, relishing in the feeling of scalding water surging through her, switching their positions until _she_ was pinning _Angelica_. Desperation crashed between them, flooding with wired electricity, butterflies pulsing in every inch of her. Maria drank in every precious, fleeting moment of this, because Angelica was oxygen and she needed to breathe—

Angelica was kissing her _hard_ , obviously daring as she was, eyelashes having fluttered closed. It was beginning to scare Maria, this fiery-hot rashness they shared, even as her hands slipped around Angelica’s neck, pulling them in closer. 

This 

was 

electric. 

And then Maria thought, _Dolley_. 

The butterflies shattered. 

She shoved her off. Tasted the last of Angelica’s mouth, sugary and bitter at the same time. Felt rushed apologies and incoherent, frantic protests rise to her lips. 

“I—I can’t. It’s not you—I just—we— _I_ —”

Angelica looked unnerved. “Why?” she whispered, voice rough and raw and _revealing_.

She tugged at her lip fiercely and said, “There’s someone else, and I can’t go on like we have for—how long? A month?” Maria bit the inside of her cheek, casting her eyes down. “It’s throwing me off. Every time . . . I feel so _guilty_. I can’t. . .” She was pleading now, she could tell. 

“There’s somebody _else_.” It wasn’t a question, but Angelica’s voice sounded oddly hollow and snarling at the same time. Maria flinched back, sudden remorse flaring up along her lungs like white-hot flames. “You’ve just been playing me,” Angelica bit out, and each word was a dagger stabbing itself into Maria’s chest, lethal and laced with venom. “This—this is all a _game_ to you—you—”

“It’s not a game!” Maria’s voice sounded weak even to her own ears, reverberating around her head. “I don’t—”

She was a mess. 

She was _pathetic_. 

And for the first time in her life, she didn’t care. 

Angelica spat out a curse, but her eyes looked suddenly dead, their dancing twinkle of knowledge abruptly extinguished. 

Her phone went off. 

When she glanced at it, her entire expression went slack, Her mouth formed a perfect, horrified ‘o’, and she dashed off without so much as a “I’m leaving”, or even, “I hate you.” 

Maria was left to slide to the floor, alone, dazed, apologetic. 

She wasn’t sure if she would have preferred “I hate you” to this. . . . this _nothing_.

No, this wasn’t love, this connection she had with Angelica Schuyler. This was the result of almost two years of fast-paced momentum, their awkward, fluid dance around each other battle after battle, the pain they flung at each other and the illusions thrown on the table between them, common sense plummeting down, down, down into the abyss. 

This wasn’t love

it was just 

 _electric_.

Battle after battle, meet-up after meet-up. No words, no conversation. Just. . . electric.

Maria didn’t want a love triangle dynamic. She didn’t want to choose—and if she was being perfectly honest, didn’t have to. She didn’t want a romantic partner who she hardly knew and barely trusted, that was a physical outlet for frustration and lust. She didn’t want to be caught in a loveless relationship, where all the energy flowed one way and she was caught in the middle, unwilling to tear away and escape to another but refusing to restrain herself to somebody who didn’t own her mind and soul, who didn’t match up her rougher seams and click in between her flaws.

What _did_ she want?

_Last night, I held on to my mind, my consciousness, my sanity, not for Angelica, but for another._

Although Maria didn’t say it, the connotation hovered in the air unspoken.

Her heart didn’t belong to Angelica Schuyler, because it wasn’t hers to give away. 

Not anymore. 

 

 

»»——————¤——————««

 

Angelica was eighteen years old, had broken up with a boyfriend before, and was legally an adult. She could _handle_ basic rejection. 

She didn’t _need_ to heal. 

Maria wasn’t hers. She was perfectly okay with that, because why would she not be? Especially when Howe had just _killed_ an entire family, the nation was in frenzied turmoil, and she had to focus. 

Archangel stormed across the tops of the buildings, and the pedestrians below took one look at the furious glint her eyes had acquired and fled. She was not in a good mood, and it was evidently obvious to them why. 

Howe. How dare he. How _dare_ he stand there for years and years making speeches about how he was going to _help_ the country, _mold_ the country, letting lies fall from his mouth like damn rose petals in a wedding. He was going to _fix_ the country, he used to say while campaigning, hands clasped behind his back, eyes glistening maddeningly with that shady-politician look in them. 

Always about the country. Never the people. 

Inwardly fuming about the infernal, murderous, maniac effectively distracted her from the crack of sorrow that had cleaved her heart clean in half, so Angelica continued to pace the rooftops, the magma in her rising and rising until it threatened to burst and bubble up through the surface. Angrily, she thrusted out her hand and blasted the sky with lightning, watching it scorch for a moment before fizzling out. 

Using her powers was like taking a shot of epinephrine, sending sparklers of excitement exploding in her blood. It was positively enthralling. 

Hastily trying to distract herself, Angelica firmly went back to agonizing about their current . . . situation.

  _We’re never going to catch Howe. There’s no way. It’s like trying to catch smoke. Like trying to catch smoke with your_ bare hands _._

Angelica froze suddenly, her fingers poised to send another furious round of sparks into the heavens. 

_Smoke._

_Fire._

Maybe they couldn’t catch Howe, but she might know someone who could. 

That was how Archangel, superheroine extraordinaire and defender of New York City, found herself talking to the Arsonist. And, miraculously, somewhat civilly, which was more than could be said if Alex was the one talking. 

_And she could not tell Alex, because he would never let her live it down._

Admittedly, it had begun rather awkwardly, with her radiating warning electricity from both hands, staring him down, and him in a defensive stance, cane held like a staff, danger gleaming in his eyes. But the moment she'd mentioned Howe, all traces of violence vanished, and he just looked. . . tired. 

A lot like she felt, actually. 

“So you’re not in league with Howe.”

“I’m not in league with Howe,” he repeated, sounding rather exasperated. He leaned on his walking cane and attempted a cocky grin, seemingly indifferent, but there was a worried crease to his forehead. 

“You have never been in contact with him.”

“That is correct.”

“You won’t divulge any information I give you to _anybody_.”

This time he did not say a word, but his lips curled up, not quite sneering at her, but not appearing all that friendly either. 

 _Was this a good idea?_ A twinge of sharp anxiety pierced her. Angelica shook her head firmly to dispel any doubts—she couldn’t afford to have any, not now—then returned to her rapid-fire interrogation of the Arsonist. 

“Is it true that you can read minds?” she demanded. 

His head tilted, an almost curious glint in his eye. “Yes.”

She recoiled immediately. How could she have been so stupid? 

 _Oh, Angelica, now you’ve ruined it,_ she mentally berated herself, paranoid that every thought she’d had he now knew. _You can’t just ignore every rumor you hear! Aaargh! What is_ wrong _with me?_

“But,” he continued, as if oblivious to her freak-out, “I can’t access the thoughts of anyone in the possession of excessive or superior capabilities, such as yourself, or I doubt you would be standing here with your identity intact.”

She blinked at him, and he sighed. 

“I can’t read supers’ minds,” he explained, drawling it out in a bored tone of voice as if it were obvious. 

“Oh.” Relief cascaded through her mind, and she launched back into her questioning, aware that if he wasn’t lying about this, it certainly explained why he hadn’t outed the heroes’ true names to the nation already. “What do you plan to do about the current . . . situation?”

He snorted. “What, you mean the Galloways’ poisoning?”

She wanted to flinch at his casual wording, but years of her father’s dinner parties during which many uncomfortable subjects cropped up allowed her to manage to keep her composure. “Yes,” she replied tartly. 

The Arsonist blinked as if seriously considering the question before shrugging. “I don’t know,” he said, exasperatingly nonchalant. 

She exhaled stiffly, mind turning. Then she lifted her eyes to meet his. They were smoldering and severe, a strikingly odd shade of blue yet somehow familiar to her. Angelica trained her gaze on him, trying to match her intensity with his, and mentally steeled herself for the last, and most important, question she had prepared.

“How do I know I can trust you?” she challenged. 

He smiled a little, but Angelica was sharp enough to catch a flash of sorrow streaking across his expression. “You don’t,” he said. “How do I know _I_ can trust _you_?”

And that was the moment that she knew she didn’t have a choice; there was no backing away at this point. Earn his trust or die trying. 

She had to prove she wasn’t playing him. 

So she opened her mouth

and the truth 

s p i l l e d out. 

“MynameisAngelicaSchuyler.” Desperation ripped the words from her mouth. “That’s my real name. And you can trust me because we have a common enemy.”

After an agonizing moment, the Arsonist slowly lowered his cane. “Okay. Okay, that’s true. But that doesn’t mean I—” 

He cut himself off quite abruptly, as though a sudden realization had just crashed into him. “Wait.” 

The silence that yawned between them like a chasm threatened to suck Angelica in and drown her, thrashing and screaming, even as no sound escaped her mouth. She felt her insides curl in on themselves and cinch into a tight knot as an unsettling grin grew on his face. He stepped forward and his fingers gripped her chin, not roughly, but as if they were brushing something they’d thought for the longest time was piping hot, and only just realized they could touch it without being scorched. 

“Did you say _Angelica Schuyler_?” he breathed.

**Author's Note:**

> Aaaaaand. . . another cliffhanger. I considered ending this section at the “and the truth spilled out” line, but decided ultimately that that was just too cruel.


End file.
